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  INTERMIX

  Published by Berkley

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  penguinrandomhouse.com

  Copyright © 2004 by Jaci Burton

  Excerpt from Wanton copyright © 2004 by Jaci Burton

  Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.

  INTERMIX and the “IM” design are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Ebook ISBN: 9780593098516

  Berkley trade paperback edition: May 2007

  First InterMix Edition: October 2020

  Cover image by Elena Kharichkina / Shutterstock

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  Cover

  Titles by Jaci Burton

  Title Page

  Copyright

  one

  two

  three

  four

  five

  six

  seven

  eight

  Excerpt from Wanton

  About the Author

  one

  “Step out of the vehicle and spread your legs.”

  Blair tapped her long, just-manicured fingernails on the leather steering wheel and stared straight ahead, counting slowly to ten before she even looked out the window to acknowledge Rand McKay’s existence. And there was no way in hell she’d obey his ridiculous order. It was bad enough he’d pulled her over on this deserted stretch of road, sirens blaring, when she was already late for lunch with Abby and Callie. But to tell her to get out of her car and spread her legs like a common criminal?

  He could kiss her ass.

  No, wait. He’d probably enjoy that. And Blair wasn’t about to do anything Rand might enjoy.

  “Get lost, Rand. I’m late for an appointment.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the slow slide of his Ray-Bans down his long, straight nose, the revelation of his steel gray eyes, the firm line of his full lips.

  She would not be affected. She would not be affected. Her pebbling nipples be damned, she would not be affected!

  “Maybe you misunderstood that siren I was wailing behind your speeding ass for the past three miles, Miss Newcastle. It means pull over and get out of the damn car. Now.”

  Miss Newcastle. Whatever. She’d known Rand McKay since elementary school and long before he became sheriff of Silverwood. And he only called her Miss Newcastle when he wanted to piss her off.

  It worked. She was good and angry. She pulled off her sunglasses and stared him down, refusing to even unbuckle her seat belt. “Mail me a ticket. You know my address.”

  He bent over and leaned well-muscled, tanned forearms on the door. “Get out of the goddamned car now, Blair. Or I’ll come in there and get you. And if I have to come in there and get you, I’ll strip-search you right here on the road.”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  “Try me.”

  With a disgusted sigh, she punched the button to release her seat belt, then flung the door open, hoping she’d toss Rand on his ass in the process. But he simply backed up with fluid ease and waited for her to exit her Mercedes. With a hard slam she shut the car door and crossed her arms in front of her.

  “What the hell is your problem?” she asked, tapping her foot on the gravel.

  She couldn’t see Rand’s eyes behind the silver of his sunglasses, but his smirk told her everything she needed to know.

  “You were speeding.”

  “Was not.”

  “Eighty-five in a sixty is definitely speeding, Blair.”

  “So write me a ticket and let me get out of here.”

  “I’ll need to see your driver’s license and insurance verification.”

  “Oh, for the love of God. Like you don’t have my data memorized.” He knew everything about her, including her address and license number. They’d known each other forever. They’d been at each other’s throats since high school. She knew Rand McKay better than any other man. The most irritating man she’d ever known. She leaned into the open window of her vehicle and took out her purse, rummaging through it for her identification.

  “Is that a gun in your purse, Blair?”

  “You know damn well it is.”

  “Put the bag down, turn around, and place your hands on the roof of your car.”

  She arched a brow. “Are you serious?”

  “Do as I say. Now.”

  “Rand, you know damn well I have a—”

  “Do it!”

  Man, he was in a pissy mood. And normally she’d fight him on this. But she could tell he was into playing cop today, and she wasn’t going to make lunch if she stood there and argued with him. This was a game. They’d played it before. If she let him have his way and he annoyed
her for a few seconds, she’d be on her way. She turned around and placed her fingertips on the roof of her car.

  “Spread your legs.”

  Which is exactly what he’d said to her when he pulled her over. Only she’d thought he was joking. “Christ, Rand. This is not funny.”

  “I’ll have to pat you down, see what else you’re hiding.”

  She shot him an irritated glare over her shoulder. “You see what I’m wearing? I could hardly be hiding much.” Her skimpy silk skirt and tank top were all she could tolerate in the summer heat. If she wasn’t meeting Blair and Callie for drinks, she wouldn’t even have a bra on.

  “Turn around and face your vehicle.”

  He kicked her legs apart and stepped behind her, the nearness of his body crowding her against her car. She breathed in the spicy scent of him, made even more powerful by the afternoon heat. What was it about this man that both infuriated her and turned her on so much?

  “I’m going to report you to your superiors,” she complained.

  “You do that.”

  He started at her wrists and ran his hands up her bare arms, over her shoulder, then made his way down. He didn’t need to touch her there, dammit. Her skin broke out in goose bumps when his fingertips brushed the outer swells of her breasts.

  “Careful there,” she warned.

  “Oh, I’m being very careful.”

  He reached around and palmed her breasts. Her sheer silk bra couldn’t hide her traitorous rising nipples, her breasts swelling eagerly into his hands.

  “That is not patting me down!”

  “Just checking to see if you have anything hidden in your bra.”

  “I do. My breasts. Now leave them alone!”

  His warm breath blew against the nape of her neck, not at all cooling the sweat there. “They don’t act as if they want me to leave them alone.” To prove his point, he scraped his thumbs over her distended nipples. She bit back the groan that wanted to escape her throat. God, that man had talented hands. And she hadn’t been touched in . . . far too long. Her clit was throbbing, her pussy wet, and her panties clung to her skin.

  She wanted sex.

  But she didn’t want Rand. She didn’t!

  “Are you quite finished?” she asked, gritting her teeth.

  “Not quite.”

  Somehow she’d make him pay for doing this to her, for forcing her to ignore her body’s needs. Any other man, and she’d have her legs wrapped around him and her pussy on his dick by now.

  But she would never, ever fuck Rand McKay.

  Not if he was the last man on earth and she was desperately horny. She’d rather fuck a cactus.

  He finally relinquished his hold on her breasts, and she exhaled, but then his hot, huge hands skimmed her rib cage, sliding up and under the tank top to touch her bare skin. She flinched.

  “Something wrong?”

  “Nothing.” She’d be damned if she’d give him the satisfaction of knowing he affected her. She’d simply pretend irritation and nothing else. And then she’d get him fired.

  His knee insinuated itself farther between her legs as his hands found her hips. When he jerked her toward him, she’d had enough.

  “Rand,” she warned.

  But her warning fell on deaf ears. He lifted her skirt and sat her on his jeans-clad thigh, the scrape of denim against her swollen clit enough to make her gasp.

  “You’re wet,” he whispered against her ear.

  “It’s hot outside. I’m sweating,” she lied.

  “Bullshit. I can smell you. That sweet scent is pussy, baby, not sweat.”

  Asshole. And his cock was hard, rubbing against her ass as he clenched her hip. She breathed in and out through her nose, trying to avoid panting. She was so aroused every fiber of her being was screaming at her to turn around and beg him to fuck her. Right there on the side of the road.

  And that’s just what he wanted her to do.

  Never!

  His hand inched along her upper leg, his fingertips traveling precariously close to her pussy. He began to rub her inner thigh now, mere inches away from her clit. If she shifted just a little, she could place the throbbing bud right in his hand. Oh, and he’d take her there. She knew he could. A few strokes, and she’d fly right over the edge. She was so damn close already. Hot, achy, her pussy quaking with need.

  She hated Rand McKay right now, hated that he had this much control over her.

  “Let me go, Rand. This has gone way beyond a simple body search.”

  “Oh, I’m searching your body all right, Blair. I’m looking for a key.”

  She swallowed, her throat dry. “What key?”

  “They key to unlocking the fire within you, Blair. Just say the word, and I’ll do it. You know I can. I’m the only one who can.”

  His fingers massaged the spot where her panties met her thigh, the side of his hand a fraction of an inch from her clit. Her swollen pussy lips trembled at his touch.

  “You need me to take you there, baby,” he said, rocking his hard cock against her. “Give up that famous Newcastle control to me, and I’ll make you come like you’ve never come before. Let me have it, Blair.”

  She froze as if a sudden icy rain had begun to fall in the dead afternoon of August. Rigid, she began to push at his hand. “Let me go, Rand.”

  And he knew it, too. In an instant he backed away, and she smoothed down her skirt, ignoring the inferno flaming inside her, the roaring climax she’d been seconds from having.

  The one she was never going to have with Rand McKay.

  Forcing a calm and cool demeanor she didn’t feel, she whirled around and took two steps toward him, placing a finger in the center of his wide, masculine chest. “Get this straight, Rand. You want to write me a ticket for speeding, fine. You want to haul me into the station for possession of a gun I have a permit to possess, do it. But don’t you ever”—she accentuated the ever with a push of her finger against his chest—“ever touch me again.”

  Instead of arguing with her, he folded his arms across his well-muscled chest and smiled smugly at her. How dare he look so unaffected when she was damn near shaking all over? If it wasn’t for the ridge of his erection clearly visible through his jeans, she could swear the man was cold as ice.

  “When you’re ready to turn over control, Blair, you know where to find me.”

  “When they announce the next Winter Olympics in hell, I’ll do that.”

  Without bothering to gauge his reaction, she mustered up what dignity she had left, slipped into her car, buckled her seat belt, and drove away, blasting the air conditioner at arctic level. She was so goddamned hot she was going to self-combust. On fire with anger and unrequited passion.

  She hated him. Absolutely hated him.

  And she’d never wanted a man more than she wanted Rand McKay.

  She always had.

  * * *

  * * *

  Rand leaned against his squad car and watched Blair speed away, her tires spitting out gravel in her wake. Breaking the speeding laws again, no doubt. He owed her a ticket, too. Then again, he knew right where to find her.

  And she knew where to find him. Which she would, soon enough.

  For fifteen years he’d watched her go through man after man. She’d even gone as far as getting engaged to three of them but had never made it to the altar yet.

  He knew why. Because none of those men could satisfy her. They didn’t understand what she needed.

  Rand knew exactly what she needed.

  Blair Newcastle might be cool, calm, and in charge on the outside, but inside she was desperate for a man to take charge and dominate her.

  He knew it, and she knew it.

  He slipped into his squad car, radioed the station that he was back on patrol, and drove off, heading toward town.

  His cock was still hard and aching. God almighty was he
miserable right now. It was all he could do to resist taking it out and jacking off on the side of the road, releasing the tight throbbing in his balls. He lifted his fingers to his nose, inhaling Blair’s sweet, musky scent that lingered on his hands.

  Shit. He groaned and mentally cursed the stubborn woman. What the hell was wrong with her, anyway? Her nipples had been tight when he’d cupped her full breasts, her pussy moist when he’d brushed his fingers against her silken panties. It had been damn torture for him not to palm her heat and take her over the edge. He’d heard the soft panting gasps she thought to mask, knew she could fall with the slightest brush of his fingers against her hard little clit. She’d been primed and ready for a good hard climax. Until she’d fought her natural urges.

  Though she’d hardly fought. Usually she cussed him out and slapped his hand away when they tussled. Not this time though. Arousal had seethed inside her, and she’d been moments away from giving up control to him.

  But she just refused to surrender the last vestiges of it, too afraid of what might happen if she submitted to him.

  They’d been dancing around each other for fifteen goddamn years. He’d never force the issue with her, because she was going to have to come to him if she wanted him to take control.

  So far she hadn’t. But he was a very patient man. And she was waffling, getting closer and closer to caving in; he could tell.

  Sooner or later she’d figure out that the only man who was going to make her happy was him.

  And when she did, he’d be ready for her.

  * * *

  * * *

  Debating whether or not to spread her legs in the car and massage her hard clit to orgasm right there in Callie’s driveway, Blair mentally cursed Rand McKay a thousand times over and turned the ignition off with an oath of disgust, dropping her keys in her purse.

  Asshole. Her body was still vibrating from his touch, the way he whispered dark promises in her ear with his deep, husky voice, enticing her toward an orgasm she was all too eager to have at his hands.

  Never. Never, never, never. Once she gave up her power to a man, she’d never be in charge of her destiny again. And Rand was alpha to the core, the kind to wrestle control away from her and stomp her freedom right into the ground. He was nothing like the men she usually dated. Nothing. The men she chose were men she could manage.